As John Jakes, praised as "the godfather of the historical novel" with more than 55 million copies of the Kent Chronicles in print suggests, a good plot soon disappears from memory. A good character, never. So move over Garp, Huck, Captain Queeg, Gus McCrae, Rabbit Angstrom, Yossarian and the rest of those literary personalities that live forever in the memories of readers. Make room for the remarkable characters that spill out of "Music From Both Sides of the Moon". In this wonderfully entertaining and touching first novel, you will embrace E. Tim Kelly, struck on the head as an infant by a cottonmouth water moccasin; the entire cast of "Professor Crady's Traveling Show of Oddities and Prodigies"; Hap O'Shea, an oddball teacher who goes fishing in storm drains and imagines balloon farms; along with an endearing cast of never-to-be-forgotten characters. "Music From Both Sides of the Moon" will take you from the smoky jazz clubs of New Orleans to the brutal battle for the island of Corregidor in the Pacific during World War II. It will lead you from the suffocating depths of pain and punishment to the purest heights of love and devotion.